Purpose: The purpose of this executive summary was to provide an overview of key findings from By the Numbers: 30th Report on Physician Assistant Educational Programs in the United States.
Methods: The 2014 Program Survey is a Web-based survey and is administered annually to all member physician assistant (PA) program directors. This executive summary will focus on 4 of the 7 sections of the survey instrument: general, financial, program personnel, and students.
Results: The typical PA program's sponsoring institution is private and in a nonacademic health center. Most PA programs (93.0%) offer a master's degree as the primary or highest credential. The average total program budget was $2,221,751 (SD=$2,426,852). The average total resident tuition was $64,961, and the average total nonresident tuition was $75,964. Overall, 181 programs reported 1843 program faculty. Of those, 1467 were identified as core faculty and 376 were identified as adjunct faculty. A typical first-year PA student is 26 years old (SD=2.51), female (70.3%, n=5898), non-Hispanic (89.3%, n=3631), White (79.9%, n=3712), and has an overall undergraduate and science grade point average (GPA) of 3.52 (SD=0.14) and 3.47 (SD=0.16), respectively. In 2014, there were approximately 7556 graduates from 164 responding programs.
Conclusion: By gaining a better understanding of the characteristics of PA programs and their faculty and students, policy makers can be better informed. Physician assistant educators and stakeholders are encouraged to use this information to advance and advocate for the profession.